The Desert
by write4truth
Summary: "Madness plants mirrors in the desert. I find the means frightening." - Floriano Martins
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: I own nothing, absolutely nothing, nothing, nothing-except the angst contained within.**

 **Note: The following story was inspired by Bonanza Brand's bi-monthly prompts based on song lyrics.**

 **Prompt: "Even the genius asks questions."**

* * *

Adam's changed.

I still don't know full well what happened to him in that desert; I don't think any of us do. But older brother's not the same. I wouldn't never say this out loud, least not in

front of Pa, but some days Adam acts plumb loco.

It don't take much to make him snap. Like at breakfast. Adam dropped his fork and Little Joe made a crack about him eatin' with his fingers.

Adam banged his chair back and if Joe was a second slower ducking he would've taken a plateful of scrambled eggs an' bacon to the head.

The plate crashed against the wall and for a long minute we all were real still. Adam had his legs wide apart and his fisted hands out from his sides, and his eyes kept dartin'

from one of us to the other, like we might come at him. When none of us moved he straightened up, brushed a piece of egg off his pants, and walked away.

Pa finally said, "Adam."

He didn't even look back, just went around the corner, and then the front door creaked open and gently shut again with a click.

Might as well have slammed it.

* * *

I found him by the grave.

It was about the last place I looked. Adam don't visit her much, least not that I know about. But he was there, crouched on the ground by Marie's headstone.

His gun dangled from his hand.

I said, "Hey."

Without lookin' up, he said, "I don't know why I'm here."

"Don't reckon it matters much." I kept my eye on that gun.

Adam snorted. "Even the genius asks questions, Hoss." Rockin' on his heels, he muttered, "Not that he ever gets answers."

"Sometimes we don't get to know the answers." I was inchin' closer to him, boots shufflin' one step at a time through the grass.

"And you're content with that."

"Most of the time. But I ain't smart like you, Adam."

He let out a dry bark like a laugh. He rubbed his face with his free hand. "I need a shave."

"You want, I'll give ya a hand with that, once we get back to the house." A few more feet and I could reach out and touch him.

"Stay there, Hoss."

He said it quiet and tired, hand tightening around the gun.

I stopped. "You ain't gonna use that," I told him.

"Not on you." He grinned in an empty way. "I may be crazy, but I'm not about to shoot my own brother."

"You ain't crazy, Adam."

"Not yet." The grin disappeared. "How long before it's worse than a plate to the head?"

I tried to make it a joke. "Ya couldn't hit the broad side of a barn, anyway."

"I could've hurt him. I wanted to hurt him."

"You know you wouldn't."

"No, I don't know!" Adam shot to his feet. "I don't know anything anymore."

He put the gun up to his head and cocked it.


	2. Chapter 2

**Prompt: "I got an emptiness deep inside, and I've tried but it won't let me go."**

* * *

I've been afraid before.

Folks might think a big ol' cuss like me don't scare easy, but between cattle rustlers and outlaw gangs, and Little Joe's tendency to trouble, I've had my share of fear.

None of that even compares to seein' my older brother hold a gun to his own head.

"Adam," I said. "Put it down."

He stared through me. Sweatin' like he was still in the heat of that desert, back bent under the weight of a dead man.

Seemed like that weight had never left him, draggin' him down into a dark hole. I had to hold onto him, keep him from tumblin' into it, and there wasn't nothin' tethering us

but thread.

"Who was that man, Adam?" I asked. Keep him talkin'. "What'd he do to you?"

His eyes focused on me. "Kane?" He laughed and the muzzle of the gun jumped a little against his temple. "Kane was just the eagle."

"Heh?" Too much distance between us to try tacklin' him. Too much time for him to pull that trigger.

"Couple of roosters are fightin' it out over who's top gun," Adam said, in his story-telling voice. "The better rooster wins, and the loser goes off to sulk while the winner gets

up on a high wall and starts flappin' and crowin' about his victory." Adam rubbed at the sweat on his face with his free hand. "Only there's an eagle watching, and it swoops in

and grabs the winning rooster and carries him off to eat."

It was one of them fables Pa used to read to us. "So you're the rooster? That what you're sayin'?"

"Pride cometh before destruction," Adam muttered. "Kane took me down off my high wall. Way, way down." He sobbed once. "You should go home, Hoss."

"Not without you, I ain't." I took a chance and stepped closer.

He pressed the muzzle harder into his skin. His thumb trembled on the hammer.

That ol' thread was stretching thin.

"All right." Raising my hands up, I told him, "I ain't comin' closer. But I'm not leavin', neither. So if you're gonna blow your brains out you're gonna have to do it with me right

here."

Adam snarled out a couple of words I ain't never heard him use before. But he was waverin', his grip on the gun slipping.

I repeated, "I ain't leavin', Adam."

"Oh, _God_."

He flung the gun away from him. Metal thunked wood as the gun bounced off a tree and then fell to the grass with a soft thud.

I ain't never heard a sweeter sound.

Adam fell to his knees, and I moved as quick as I could to crouch next to him. He rocked back and forth, arms wrapped tight around his stomach as if he had to keep his

insides from fallin' out.

"I got an emptiness, Hoss," he sobbed. "Deep inside. And I've tried but it won't let me go."

He looked at me, wanting answers.

I didn't have any.


End file.
